1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to managing the consumption of an energy commodity within premises. More specifically, the invention relates to direct monitoring and control of energy-consuming devices via centralized programmed control as directed by a consumer or by the provider of the energy commodity via one or more local and remote user interfaces.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
Control of energy-consuming appliances has historically been implemented through local controls provided by the appliance manufacturer, where the term “appliance” is used generically herein to refer to a device coupled to an energy provider's supply system. Such control has generally been facilitated at each individual appliance in a manner appropriate for that appliance. Such implementations, however, neither provide for control of appliances anywhere other than locally nor provide control in a manner to account for pertinent external factors such as weather, time-dependent cost of energy or a consumer's unanticipated change of schedule.
To overcome the lack of remote control capability, add-on devices were developed to control individual appliances remotely via a particular communications protocol. For example, remote control power supplies for network servers via a serial communications protocol is known as are telephonic interfaces that allow dialing in to an auto-answer appliance controller. Several home automation products exist which allow control of appliances remotely via programmed schedules and wireless handheld controls. Such devices are restricted in their remote control capabilities in that they are generally implemented through proprietary human interfaces with limited to no user option as to how the controller may communicate with the controlled device.
The vast majority of energy-consuming appliances have no means for monitoring or measuring the amount of energy being consumed by the appliance at a given time. While auxiliary devices exist which can measure the amount of energy being consumed by an individual appliance, such devices generally have neither the capacity to make the consumption data available in a centralized manner for multiple appliances nor the capability to report this information to the consumer anywhere other than at the device itself. Additionally, such devices do not consider time-varying costs of energy and, thus, actual energy costs or savings are not readily apparent to the user.
Software applications exist which guide a consumer through an “energy audit” of their premises. Such auditing extrapolates energy use for the premises as a whole from the estimated amount of energy used by each appliance. The overall energy usage is not formulated from real-time data obtained from the appliance, but rather by approximations of energy usage based on the size and type of appliance. Prior art software applications further fail to take into account the time variant consumption of energy by each appliance and allow presentation of the data only through the application's user interface.
Thermostatic control of heating and air conditioning systems throughout premises are well known and widely used. Typically, such control systems are implemented through thermostats having simple controls for selecting levels of heating and cooling and for setting a desired “setpoint” temperature. Thermostatic controls generally are set through some manual action by the consumer each time a change in the control setting is desired. Such requirement of user intervention is highly ineffective in managing the heating and air conditioning of the user's premises due to the user's inability or reluctance to continually interact with the thermostat.
To overcome the inefficiencies of manual controls, thermostats have been developed that automate the control of the heating and air conditioning by providing means for the consumer to create a static heating/cooling schedule so as to alleviate some of the continual user interaction requirements. Such devices are typically cumbersome to program, but must be programmed often, such as when seasons change or when change in lifestyle is desired. The user may thus procrastinate and allow much time to pass before reprogramming. Clearly, such systems are only as efficient as the user's ability and desire to perform the required programming. Certain programmable thermostats also allow for short term and long term disabling of the scheduled control, but these thermostats fail to implement an explicit reminder mechanism to compel the consumer to resume automatic scheduled function once it has been disabled. Typical programmable thermostats also lack remote access to the controls so that the user must be physically located at the thermostat to institute any change in the programmed environmental control policy.
Pool pumps also have been targeted for reduction in energy consumption. However, pool pump control is typically achieved via a programmable timer for selecting one or more periods during the day to operate the pool pump, thereby creating a static schedule for filtering the pool water. These devices operate in an open loop which does not take into account constantly changing ambient conditions that affect pool sanitation, such as the amount of sunlight incident on the pool, ambient temperature and amount of pool use. This shortcoming in control flexibility often leads to a situation where the consumer schedules the pool pump to run in accordance with worst case conditions, which requires the pump to operate longer than is necessary to sanitize the pool.
Certain energy providers have developed and deployed systems to reduce energy consumption in certain areas during periods where peak demand approaches production capacity. These systems typically consist of appliance controls that can interrupt the power to an appliance under the direct control of the energy provider, such as through unidirectional transmission of control signals originating at the provider to the control devices coupled to the appliances. In many cases, a local override mechanism is provided to allow a consumer to restore power to a device for which power has been interrupted by the energy provider. Often, such activation by the consumer is in conflict with a prearranged agreement with the provider and the location of such non-compliance cannot be isolated by the energy provider. Multiple devices within individual premises or multiple premises in a neighborhood are generally controlled together and, as such, all devices respond at once to each control signal. There is presently no mechanism available to the energy provider to allow control over energy consumption at individual devices or individual premises for purposes of high demand allocation of resources, or otherwise.
In light of the state of the art in energy monitoring and control, the need is apparent for more flexible management of energy use within premises.